La vampire nue

Pierre Radamante (Olivier Rollin) tries to help a beautiful young woman (Caroline Cartier) who is being pursued by people wearing creepy animal masks and brandishing guns. Pierre is unable to save the woman from being shot and captured. He follows the masked people to their headquarters- a club where his father, Georges (Maurice Lemaître), is a member. Pierre sets out to discover what is going on inside, and finds out that his father and his associates are experimenting on the beautiful woman: they believe she is a vampire and that, through her, they will be able to achieve immortality.

Jean Rollin's The Nude Vampire doesn't deliver on its title: she's never actually nude, always draped in one of the director's trademark pieces of coloured chiffon, and she's not even a vampire. What the film does deliver are plenty of seriously strange and surreal sequences, none of which make much sense, but which are so totally bizarre that the film still proves a fairly entertaining experience. The random weirdness includes a woman in a red wig and plastic nipple cones dancing to bongo drums, women with white faces, bindi dots and blue nipples, a pair of twins who dress in identical bizarre outfits, an artist's model who busily fondles her breasts, Georges' bizarre collection of mutilated toy dolls, rituals involving sacks placed over the head, and a suicide cult. But Rollin saves the best for last, the final scene (which takes place on the same beach that is in the majority of his films) involving inter-dimensional mutants who are the next step in human evolution.

The whole film is summed up perfectly by an exchange of dialogue between a couple of Georges' associates: "Do you understand any of this?" says the first guy. "Not really," comes the reply. It makes me suspect that Rollin knew what an incomprehensible mess this really was.

Ahhhh... the title of the film cheapens it so much.

I watched this largely because the BFI endorsed it and I was looking for a cheap, silly 70s horror, much in the vein of Dario Argento. By and large, that's what I got. Great.

I was however, pleasantly surprised, that it tried to be a bit more than just a slasher/vampire film. There was a story to it but unfortunately, that story was a bit incoherent and ill thought through to really appreciate. It had roots but just, didn't exactly sprout.

A film with potential but in the end, I think they just accepted their place among the vast collection of horror B-Movies of the time.

Worth a watch at 1 in the morning but not a main feature film.

Nude Vampire, The (1970)

** (out of 4)

Strange film from French director Rollin has a young man coming across a nude woman who he witnesses shot dead minutes later. The man decides to investigate, which leads him to a strange scientist doing experiments with blood and a suicide cult. I've seen quite a few Rollin films over the years and this one here just doesn't work. The film doesn't have many brains but it throws in this wild story and it just never really makes any sense. This is one of those low rent films that tries to be a lot smarter than it actually is but for the most part all of this stuff just leads to boredom. The biggest problem with the film is its slow pace, which is the norm for a Rollin picture. Sometimes this slow pace really helps but often times it hurts and that's the case here. The performances really aren't anything special and even though there's quite a bit of nudity, none of it is ever erotic. The cinematography is quite good as is the music score but that's about the only thing this film has going for it.

The eighth Jean Rollin film I have watched is also possibly the weirdest; the intriguing plot (such as it is) seems initially to be too flimsy to sustain even its trim 84 minutes but it somehow contrives to get inordinately muddled as it goes along! A would-be female vampire (scantily-clad, as promised by the title) is held in captivity inside a remote château and emerges only to 'feast' on the blood of willing victims (who are apparently members of a suicide club) As if unsure where all of this would lead him, the writer-director ultimately has the human villain – actually the blank-faced hero's kinky father – ludicrously revealed as a mutant(?!) from the future! The languorous pace and dream-like atmosphere (the cultists wear hoods and animal masks to hide their features from the sheltered girl) are, of course, typical of both the film-maker (ditto the seashore setting at the {anti}climax) and the "Euro-Cult" style, as are the bevy of nubile beauties on display. Personally, the most enjoyable thing about the whole visually attractive but intellectually vacuous affair was watching familiar character actor Bernard Musson (who appeared in six latter-day Luis Bunuel films) crop up bemusedly through it from time to time!

Following a strange encounter with a young woman, Pierre (Olivier Martin) begins snooping around the location where he last saw her and quickly uncovers a mystery leading all the way to his own father. See, Pierre's dad has kidnapped this vampire girl and is using his company in order to try to find out the secret to her immortality. This is director Jean Rollin's second vampire film but the first one that I've witnessed. I'm not sure it is entirely successful, but it clearly establishes some Rollin motifs. I did enjoy the dream-like staging even if it has a slumber-like pace at only 81 minutes long. As always, Rollin has a keen eye for the ladies and everyone here is downright gorgeous. Especially of note are the twin servants, played by real life twins Marie-Pierre & Catherine Castel. Rollin also has an equally good eye at catching some great images and the final half hour set in a picturesque château in the country features some really striking bits. Of course, you know he is going to work that beach in there too and the last few minutes feature that famous location (plus a dimensional jump and twist that reminded me a bit of PHANTASM).